Mastercard will pay UK grocery chain Sainsbury’s £68.5 million ($90.5 million) in damages following a lawsuit over interchange fees, according to the Financial Times.

In the case, Sainsbury’s asserted that Mastercard’s default interchange fees, which are charged on a per transaction basis, were too high. For context, the case is one of several following a 2014 European Commission hearing that found that Mastercard’s high interchange fees had broken competition laws.

The ruling affirms that card network fees can have adverse impacts on merchants. The court argued that merchants are all but required to accept cards from all issuers, according to The Wall Street Journal. That’s especially true with a network as large as Mastercard, which counted 2.3 billion cardholders worldwide in Q1 2016.

But that “requirement” gives card networks the power to freely assess interchange rates when left unchecked. And those high rates could, in the worst case, push merchants to shift some of that burden to consumers in the form of higher prices or surcharges, which could limit business. As a result, the judge assessed Mastercard with damages worth the difference between the cost of the fees it charged and a lower fee structure.

The ruling could set a precedent for future interchange litigation.

This is the first major victory in a competition damages claim in the UK, according to the Financial Times. That could be critical for other cases moving forward, especially because a £19 billion ($25 billion) class action lawsuit related to high interchange fees that impacted UK prices is on the horizon.

And it could push card networks to re-evaluate their policies as similar lawsuits emerge globally. In the US, major retailers including Walmart, Home Depot, and Kroger have sued card networks like Visa and Mastercard over high interchange fees. This newfound resistance might push fees, which are already regulated in many countries, lower or cause card networks to act more leniently when determining fee structure.

This ruling could have a lasting effect on the overall payments ecosystem, which is continually evolving thanks to a slew of digital innovations.

Evan Bakker and John Heggestuen, analysts at BI Intelligence, Business Insider's premium research service, have compiled a detailed report on the payments ecosystem that drills into the industry to explain how a broad range of transactions are processed, including prepaid and store cards, as well as revealing which types of companies are in the best and worst position to capitalize on the latest industry trends.

Here are some key takeaways from the report:

2016 will be a watershed year for the payments industry. Payments companies are improving security, expanding their mobile offerings, and building commerce capabilities that will give consumers a more compelling reason to make purchases using digital devices.

Payments is an extremely complex industry. To understand the next big digital opportunity lies, it's critical to understand how the traditional credit- and debit-processing chain works and what roles acquirers, processors, issuing banks, card networks, independent sales organizations, gateways, and software and hardware providers play.

Alternative technologies could disrupt the processing ecosystem. Devices ranging from refrigerators to smartwatches now feature payment capabilities, which will spur changes in consumer payment behaviors. Likewise, blockchain technology, the protocol that underlies Bitcoin, could one day change how consumer card payments are verified.

In full, the report:

Uncovers the key themes and trends affecting the payments industry in 2016 and beyond.

Gives a detailed description of the stakeholders involved in a payment transaction, along with hardware and software providers.

Offers diagrams and infographics explaining how card transactions are processed and which players are involved in each step.

Analyzes the alternative technologies, including blockchain, which could further disrupt the ecosystem.

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